The Color of Your Skin Ain’t the Color of Your Heart (14 page)

I got down on my knees and poked my head in.

There was Katie down in the cellar with a shovel in her hand, sleeves rolled up, dirt on her hands and face, and sweating like she’d been working down there for hours. The chest where we’d found the gold coins in her uncle’s trousers was shoved to one side, and all the things inside it were strewn about on the dirt floor. And there were holes all about the cellar where she had apparently been digging.

“Katie,” I said as I climbed down, “what are you doing!”

The lantern she’d brought down was flickering like it was about out of oil. I noticed the old brass lantern she’d tried to move that other time and wondered why she hadn’t lit it, since it was bigger. Katie looked up at me but kept right on digging.

“It’s got to be here!” she said.

“What does?” ‘

‘The gold … there’s got to be more gold! I know my uncle had more gold than just those few coins.”

Whack
went the shovel again into the hard dirt. But she was hardly scooping much out. The floor was so dry and hard packed, and Katie was obviously exhausted.

“How long have you been down here?” I asked.

“I don’t know,” said Katie in a weary voice. “A few hours. I couldn’t sleep from worrying about the money and Rosewood and what’s going to happen.”

“Why don’t you take a rest. Come up and let’s have some breakfast and then we can talk about it.”

“I don’t want to talk about it!” she snapped. “And I don’t want any breakfast. I want to find the gold! We’ve got to pay back the bank.”

She looked at me and her eyes were flashing. I’d never seen a look like it in Katie’s face before. It was as if the idea of the gold had possessed her.

She went on trying to dig the hole deeper.

“Do you think it might be … there?” I asked. “Right there? Is that why you’re digging that hole?”

“That’s what people do, don’t they?” she said. “They bury gold in the ground.” She threw another small shovelful of dirt onto the pile beside the hole.

“But why … right
there
?” I asked again. “What made you think to start digging right there?”

Katie stopped and her hands were trembling. Then I saw her eyes filling with tears. The shovel fell from her hands with a thud and she nearly collapsed on the dirt floor.

“Oh, Mayme … I don’t know!” she wailed. “Nothing made me start digging here, I just did. I don’t know why. There’s no reason it should be here … I just had to do something. I just looked through the chest, and then moved it away and started digging. It might just as well be over under that potato barrel in the corner. It’s stupid … I’m stupid for thinking of such a thing. I just … I just don’t know what to do! And I’m so worried they’ll take Rosewood from us!”

She began to sob and sat there with her dirty hands in her face and tears pouring down her cheeks.

I knelt beside her and wrapped my arms around her. Katie sobbed and sobbed. If she had really been up half the night, no wonder she was exhausted and her emotions were worn to a frazzle.

We sat there for a long time and I let her cry.

“Why don’t we go upstairs,” I said. “You can get cleaned up and have something to eat and maybe take a bath and a nap. You’ll feel better after a bath and some sleep.”

Katie didn’t argue. I helped her to her feet and toward the steps. I could tell she was completely spent. I doubted whether she’d even make it through breakfast and a bath before falling asleep.

But before I could even get her back up out of the cellar, suddenly Emma’s head appeared in the opening above our heads.

“You better come up quick,” she said. “Dat man’s here agin.”

S
URPRISE
V
ISITOR

20

E
MMA’S WORDS SENT A CHILL THROUGH ME
. Whoever she meant I didn’t know, but visitors around here were not usually a welcome sight.

I helped Katie up the stairs and then followed her, carrying the lantern she’d brought down with her. I handed it up to Emma and then climbed the last few steps up into the parlor.

In the doorway to the kitchen stood Templeton Daniels.

“My, my!” he said in that humorous voice of his. “This is quite a sight! What were you looking for down there—buried treasure!”

Then he looked at me, and all the humor and wittiness went out of his expression. He got the oddest, most serious look on his face. It was almost like there was something inside him he was trying to say but couldn’t get out.

“Hello, Mayme,” he said after a second or two. His voice was quiet, strange, calm, completely different than how he’d spoken to Katie. He held my eyes with his just a second … and then smiled, almost nervously, I thought.

“Uncle Templeton,” said Katie, breaking the strange spell in the air that had even temporarily silenced Emma. “What a surprise—what are you doing here?”

Again an odd look passed over her uncle’s face, and again came a smile. “Let’s just say I left a little suddenly last time, and that I had some unfinished business here I needed to take care of.”

He looked better than the last time we had seen him, better groomed and his clothes cleaner. He didn’t look like he was trying to hide from someone like I’d thought last time. I got the idea he had come, strange as it was to say it … because he actually
wanted
to see us.

“What kind of business?” asked Katie.

“Never mind about that right now. Let’s just say that I need to have a long talk with the two of you—”

As he said it he glanced over at me. I couldn’t imagine what he wanted to talk to
me
about, unless he had decided what to do about Katie’s future and wanted me to know about it.

“—There’s plenty of time for all that,” he went on. “But what’s all this?” he added. “You look like you’ve been prospecting, Kathleen.”

“Oh, Uncle Templeton,” said Katie, “the bank’s going to take Rosewood away if we don’t pay back my mama’s loan, and there’s not enough money and the rain ruined the cotton and I was looking for Uncle Ward’s gold!”

Mr. Daniels took in Katie’s flood of information with a thoughtful nod.

“You know, Kathleen,” he said after a moment, “I spent the night in your barn out there and I’m hungry and could use a cup or two of good strong coffee. So why don’t we see what we can find in here to eat, and then we’ll talk about it.”

Almost the same moment, a cry sounded from William upstairs and Emma ran off to tend to him. Then Aleta’s steps came bounding down the stairs but stopped abruptly when she saw Katie’s uncle standing there.

While Katie was explaining it all to Aleta, I went into the kitchen, stoked up the fire, put on some water to boil, and got out some bread and milk and cheese and eggs for breakfast.

“Why did you sleep in the barn?” Katie was asking as she and Aleta and Mr. Daniels came into the kitchen.

“I didn’t get here until late, Kathleen,” he said. “I didn’t want to bother you young ladies, or frighten you. So I just snuck into the barn as quietly as I could.”

“Did you sleep well?”

“It wasn’t exactly the sort of accommodations I’m used to,” he laughed, “but I managed to doze off. But tell me, do cows and horses
ever
sleep? It seemed I heard them moving and shuffling and snorting all night long!”

“I don’t know, Uncle Templeton.”

Ten minutes later we were all seated at the table and I had just poured Mr. Daniels some coffee. He took the steaming cup in his hands and put his nose to it almost like the smell was better than drinking it. “That smells mighty fine, Mayme,” he said, looking up at me with a smile. “Thank you.”

“Do you know where it is, Uncle Templeton?” said Katie as she munched on a piece of buttered bread. “Did Uncle Ward or Mama tell you what he did with his gold?”

“Well, your mama, God rest her soul, knew me well enough, I’m sorry to say,
not
to tell me anything about it,” he answered, sipping at the cup. “That is, if she knew anything herself. And Ward and I weren’t exactly on the best of terms when he disappeared, so you can be sure
he
never told me anything. So I don’t even know if there is any gold, Kathleen,” he added with a sigh. “And that’s the truth. All I know is that there are some men who think there is, and they’ve been hounding me for a year trying to get onWard’s trail.”

“Yes … those must be the same men who came here looking for him!”

A concerned look came over his face.

“When?” he asked.

“Twice,” answered Katie. “Once a year ago, and then again just last week.”

“They know about Rosewood… . You mean
those
are the men you chased off with guns?!”

Katie nodded.

“Hmm … that’s not good. They didn’t … do anything—hurt any of you?” said Mr. Daniels, glancing around at the rest of us, still looking serious.

“No—we fooled them and they left.”

“Well, they’re likely to be back. They don’t give up easily. It’s taken me a long time to shake them loose. I made the mistake of tangling with one of them once in a poker game too, and that didn’t help. I’m afraid I took him for quite a bit of money. It sure won’t do for them to find me here. That will make it bad for all of us. They’re sure to think something’s up then, and it will put you in even more danger than you are now.”

“But what about the gold, Uncle Templeton?” persisted Katie. “What about the gold!” That same desperate sound had come back into her voice that she’d had down in the basement. I thought she was going to start crying again.

Mr. Daniels let out a long sigh.

“I don’t know, Kathleen,” he said. “For a long time I was convinced that Ward had struck it big in California too. But now I’m not so sure. Your ma wouldn’t have let the place run down if she could help it. A lot of tales of gold got spun in California. And I imagine a few of them were true. But a lot more weren’t. More men lost their lives trying to get rich than got rich. Most of the tales are just that—tales … stories without much truth in them. To make a long story short, Kathleen, I don’t think Ward had any gold.”

“Then what are we going to do, Uncle Templeton?” said Katie in a forlorn voice. “What are we going to
do
! We can’t let them take Rosewood away.”

It was obvious by now that Katie was too tired even to cry. Her eyelids were drooping. Sitting down and having something to eat had made her so drowsy she was about to fall asleep right at the table.

“Katie,” I said, “why don’t we get you cleaned up and you can take a nap and then you can talk to your uncle later.”

“A good idea!” said Mr. Daniels, finishing off the last of the coffee in his cup. “Nobody’s going to take Rosewood from us today, and we’ll have plenty of time to talk later and try to figure out what’s to be done. In the meantime, I’ll bring my things in. Actually, I could use a little rest too!”

“You … you won’t leave, will you, Uncle Templeton?” asked Katie.

“No, Kathleen,” he said with a smile that seemed a little sad. “I’ve done too much leaving in my life. For the first time I suppose I care about something other than myself.”

Strange to say, his voice was almost quivering as he spoke. I glanced toward him. He was looking straight at me. His eyes met mine and I glanced away.

“No, Kathleen,” he added, “I won’t leave … at least not until I do what I came to do.”

Whether she understood what he meant any better than I did, I don’t know. But for the moment it seemed to comfort her that he’d said
us
about nobody taking Rosewood away today, and made her feel like she wasn’t alone anymore. “Thank you, Uncle Templeton” was all Katie said.

“Thank you for coming back.”

I helped Katie to her feet and took her upstairs. She was too exhausted, mentally and physically, for a bath. So I just washed her face and hands and arms and got her into a clean nightgown. Within ten minutes she was sound asleep.

When I went back downstairs to the kitchen, Mr. Daniels was gone.

A C
ONVERSATION
I
'D
N
EVER
F
ORGET

21

T
HE MORNING PASSED QUIETLY
. K
ATIE SLEPT A
long time, and Mr. Daniels busied himself with his horse and then brought his things in and put them in the same room he’d slept in before.